2 New received atari st with some problems

[Serge Mattheeuws]

Hi, i´m New here and have some questions about 2 atari st i received today. 

First about a atari 1040 stfm: the floppy disk get sometimes stuck when i push the eject button and with a pincet i can get it out.

 

Second about a atari 1040 stf that makes a big noise once  from the diskdrive and on the screen i get no icons for the diskdrives a and b also no icon for the trash bin, i do get the pull down menu above.

 

I hope that anyone can help me to solve these problems.

Thanks and kind regards 

Serge Mattheeuws 

[TZJB]

1 hour ago, Serge Mattheeuws said:

Hi, i´m New here and have some questions about 2 atari st i received today. 

First about a atari 1040 stfm: the floppy disk get sometimes stuck when i push the eject button and with a pincet i can get it out.

 

Second about a atari 1040 stf that makes a big noise once  from the diskdrive and on the screen i get no icons for the diskdrives a and b also no icon for the trash bin, i do get the pull down menu above.

 

I hope that anyone can help me to solve these problems.

Thanks and kind regards 

Serge Mattheeuws 

 

Welcome to AtariAge.

 

What tools do you have as you will most certainly have to take the cases apart to inspect both machines?

 

From your description both of the floppy disk drives will need servicing.

 

It would be helpful if you could supply some images of both of the Atari ST machines, inside and out.

 

The first port of call should be to inspect the mains power supplies. They may have already been serviced but you will need to determine this.

 

The power supplies are mounted on their own chassis within the machine as they tend to operate at a fairly high temperature.

 

New replacement electrolytic capacitors are usually called for which will require basic soldering skills.

 

These are normally the only electrolytic capacitors of concern in an Atari ST with the components on the motherboard still able to supply good service.

[Zogging Hell]

The 'no drive icons' might mean the STf floppy has become disconnected or completely failed. With the other STfm the drive it depends on where it is catching. You might be able to sort this with a thorough clean and regreasing of the drive internals. I would completely stop putting floppies in the drive for now though, as when floppies catch they tend to pull the metal shutter wider making things worse (in fact it might be worth checking the floppy you are using as it may already be exhibiting this behaviour - I would either discard of a disk that has gone like this or change the metal shutter - a bit fiddly). As TZJB said though you will have to open the machines to sort the problem, and you may decide to just replace the drive with a floppy emulator depending on what you want to do with the STs. If the STf is sporting a big button drive then it may well be single sided anyway, which can be a problem, and the larger drive button makes replacement a bit more difficult.

[Serge Mattheeuws]

Ok,thanks for the answers and i gonna open the st´s this weekend to take a look, i think about replacing the  both with a gotek drive, i never did this  before so is this a easy replacement or not? Also off topic i have a notator dongle without the software what is that value of that? It came with the 2 atari ´s

 

Kind regards Serge Mattheeuws 

[TZJB]

3 hours ago, Zogging Hell said:

The 'no drive icons' might mean the STf floppy has become disconnected or completely failed. With the other STfm the drive it depends on where it is catching. You might be able to sort this with a thorough clean and regreasing of the drive internals. I would completely stop putting floppies in the drive for now though, as when floppies catch they tend to pull the metal shutter wider making things worse (in fact it might be worth checking the floppy you are using as it may already be exhibiting this behaviour - I would either discard of a disk that has gone like this or change the metal shutter - a bit fiddly). As TZJB said though you will have to open the machines to sort the problem, and you may decide to just replace the drive with a floppy emulator depending on what you want to do with the STs. If the STf is sporting a big button drive then it may well be single sided anyway, which can be a problem, and the larger drive button makes replacement a bit more difficult.

 

I agree, except that the 1040STF/M were manufactured with a 720K DSDD drive and 1 MB of RAM, with the 1040STF mainly aimed at the business market due to the requirement of a monitor. A 360K SSDD drive would be a poor substitute for the original.

 

3 hours ago, Serge Mattheeuws said:

Ok,thanks for the answers and i gonna open the st´s this weekend to take a look, i think about replacing the  both with a gotek drive, i never did this  before so is this a easy replacement or not? Also off topic i have a notator dongle without the software what is that value of that? It came with the 2 atari ´s

 

Kind regards Serge Mattheeuws 

 

Gotek drives are a good floppy substitute but come with their own problems. The first being the Atari ST floppy power cable is seldom long enough to allow the Gotek to fit back in place without extension. The second being able to see the OLED display if it's built in to the drive housing, assuming you have a display at all. I haven't explored all options myself and I know that the display can be mounted externally with adaption.

 

Regarding Notator, I think it may have been cracked long ago however there may be some interest in the dongle if you list it. You could ask in Atari-Forum. A full package was listed recently. https://www.atari-forum.com/viewtopic.php?p=447992

[Zogging Hell]

1 hour ago, TZJB said:

 

A 360K SSDD drive would be a poor substitute for the original.

 

Totally, I meant finding a replacement floppy drive to fit with the large button can be tricky (and with the small one as well) without chopping about round the case, although I was not aware all STF's were double sided from the get go, my one had a single sided drive in when I got it but it had been heavily fiddled with..

[TZJB]

9 hours ago, Zogging Hell said:

Totally, I meant finding a replacement floppy drive to fit with the large button can be tricky (and with the small one as well) without chopping about round the case, although I was not aware all STF's were double sided from the get go, my one had a single sided drive in when I got it but it had been heavily fiddled with..

 

Only the original 520ST/520STFM were marketed with a 360K drive, either seperately or internally. People quickly caught on and bought the 720K drives and some may even have been dishonest about it by swapping the drives over!

[Serge Mattheeuws]

Hi, is a acsi2stm card then not a better option then a internal gotek?much easier to install, cheaper and if you have more then one st you can swap it easily?

[Zogging Hell]

1 hour ago, TZJB said:

 

Only the original 520ST/520STFM were marketed with a 360K drive, either seperately or internally. People quickly caught on and bought the 720K drives and some may even have been dishonest about it by swapping the drives over!

Think mine was probably a case of failure and replacement with a single sided because it fitted the case. There was also a external drive switch to flip A and B so an external double sided could be used and a borked SF354 with it. Better single sided than nothing

[Jfcatari]

9 hours ago, Serge Mattheeuws said:

Hi, is a acsi2stm card then not a better option then a internal gotek?much easier to install, cheaper and if you have more then one st you can swap it easily?

Yes I would agree with that.